Taiwan’s accession to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) has been hindered by China, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Francois Wu (吳志中) said yesterday.
The ninth CPTPP Commission meeting was held in Melbourne on Friday, as Australia serves as the chair for the year.
The joint statement from the meeting said that four aspirants have been deemed in-line with the Auckland Principles — Uruguay, the United Arab Emirates, the Philippines and Indonesia — while member states agreed to start Uruguay’s accession process. Taiwan was not mentioned.
Photo: Tu Chien-jung, Taipei Times
The Auckland Principles are criteria to evaluate potential new members, which include readiness to meet the agreement’s standards, a good track record of upholding trade obligations and consensus among members
Taiwan submitted its CPTPP application on Sept. 22, 2021, about a week after China.
At the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee meeting, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Hsu Chiao-hsin (徐巧芯) asked Wu about the progress of Taiwan’s accession to the CPTPP.
Wu said Taiwan already meets the criteria of the Auckland Principles, but in the diplomatic arena, a country does not necessarily get what it wants by meeting the criteria, just as Taiwan meets the requirements of a sovereign state, but not all countries recognize it.
Taiwan has indeed encountered obstacles in its bid to join the CPTPP, Wu said.
“The obstacles come from China,” he added.
Taiwan is not being treated fairly because of China’s suppression, he said.
When Hsu asked whether China was involved in Australia’s decision not to establish a task force for Taiwan’s accession, Wu said that is likely.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Department of International Cooperation and Economic Affairs Director-General Vivian Lien (連玉蘋) said the ministry has constantly called on member countries to apply fair and effective methods to review Taiwan’s application.
It is an internal meeting among member countries, so the ministry is uncertain if any country proposed to establish Taiwan’s accession task force, Lien said.
Wu said Japan and the UK have expressed support for Taiwan’s accession, and the ministry has asked Japan to make the proposal.
Japan has explicitly expressed its continual support for Taiwan, speaking out for Taipei in several international events, and Wu said he believes Japan might have made the proposal in the meeting.
Earlier this month, Lien said at a ministry news conference that last year, then-CPTPP chair Canada had mentioned that individual member countries can hold pre-accession meetings with aspirants.
A CPTPP ministerial meeting in May reaffirmed their commitment to advancing discussions on remaining accession requests in a timely manner, in line with the Auckland Principles, and that they continue to welcome accession applications by economies that can satisfy the Auckland Principles, she said.
The ministry has continued to push for establishing institutional cooperation and demonstrating the contributions Taiwan can make in the CPTPP through multiple channels, Lien said.
Taiwan has urged next year’s CPTPP chair Vietnam to “fairly and effectively” process its application to join the major 12-member regional economic bloc, she added.
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